


Promise

by antheiasilva



Series: Glitter [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Jinnobi Challenge 2019, M/M, Mutual Pining, Qui-Gon Jinn Lives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-29
Updated: 2019-10-29
Packaged: 2021-01-13 00:15:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21234950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/antheiasilva/pseuds/antheiasilva
Summary: In the wake of the destruction at Geonosis, Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan reconsider the past and future.Sequel to Glitter, but can stand alone.-“I am a hypocrite, Qui-Gon,” Obi-Wan says, voice rough. When he finally looks up, Qui-Gon’s breath catches at the heat in Obi-Wan’s eyes. His face burns at the memory.  Almost seven years ago now, and not a word of it has passed between them in all that time.





	Promise

**Author's Note:**

> SO MANY thanks to Tohje and hubblegleeflower for swift review and enthusiasm!
> 
> And many many thanks to InfiniteJediLove for running the spectacular Jinnobi Challenge 2019!
> 
> The explicit sequel is coming, I swear!
> 
> Hahah: "coming."
> 
> Enjoy, folks! Comments welcome and treasured!

“Is it over?” Qui-Gon asks, hope and fear so sharp that for a moment they are indistinguishable. He grips Obi-Wan’s forearms, bracing him so the wounded man can stand. He cannot feel Dooku’s presence, and while he does not wish his former master dead, he has seen more than one secession movement crumble at the loss of its leader. 

Obi-Wan draws in a long breath, blinks his eyes closed as he rises. Pain makes his movements slow and halting. He shakes his head. “No,” he says steadily, blue eyes dark. His fingers dig into Qui-Gon’s forearms even though he has found his balance.

“We are at war.” Obi-Wan’s voice is low, almost a baritone. Sandy gusts of wind from the LAAT/I gunship whip through the cavernous hangar, whistling an eerie foreboding. Qui-Gon suppresses a shudder.

All he can do is nod. There are no words. The first galactic war in a millennium has begun. 

It is a strange and foreign thing to be disappointed at the survival of a man who was once so significant to him, if not exactly dear. It feels like a black mark on his heart. He swallows his disgust and drags his attention to the weary face of his padawan, who has set his jaw and squared his shoulders and released his grip on Qui-Gon. Obi-Wan’s gaze is fierce, determined, like he is already cataloguing duties—or the dead.

He slides his arm under Obi-Wan’s shoulder to support him to the gunship, ignoring a muted grunt of protest.

As they emerge into the searing sunlight of Geonosis’ endless desert, Obi-Wan squints and raises his free hand to shield his eyes. Qui-Gon’s heart clenches. So familiar and so different from a motion made on another desert world parsecs and years away. He takes in the lines at corners of Obi-Wan’s eyes, the beginning flecks of white in his beard, visible only in the brightest of light. The wind whips at their tunics, scouring away the last wisps of Obi-Wan’s youth before his eyes. 

***

In the maze-like interior of wedge-shaped behemoth Qui-Gon will later know to call an Acclamator Class Destroyer, clones and Jedi, padawans and council members, are thrown together in close quarters in the med bay. It’s disorderly, and anathema to the Jedi—well, most Jedi. Qui-Gon isn’t unnerved by the intermingling. He’s always found the Order’s insistence on distance and hierarchy to be sanctimonious and naïve. 

Still, it is strange to watch Yoda being tended to one bed away from a wounded clone and two beds away from a padawan. Stranger still to see young Senator Amidala holding his grandpadawan’s hand in open view of the wizened master, without so much as a disapproving chirp. 

Everything is upside down. Qui-Gon has seen this before—on other worlds, with other groups. Other populations. He never imagined shock and trauma of this scale in the Order.

A part of him is relieved to see that the compassion they offer to the outside world can, at the end of the day, circulate amongst themselves. To add censure to such loss would be cruel. 

He shudders to think about how close he came to losing Obi-Wan and Anakin to the bloodthirsty whims of the CIS and his fallen master. If Padme had not—

_  
“They can’t very well abandon a Republic Senator and the Chosen One, now can they?”_

_“Padme, what are you saying?”_

_“We’re going in. Make the Council see reason!”  
_

He had tried, but in the end it was Dooku’s fall that mobilized the Order to deploy several hundred Jedi Knights and risk entering an intragalactic conflict with an untried army. Thank the Force he’d been on Ryloth and mediating nothing more urgent than a decades old trade accord.  
_Present moment_ he admonishes himself, banishing the image of Obi-Wan chained to a pillar in the middle of the arena.

He approaches Obi-Wan’s bedside.

Obi-Wan is staring at Anakin and Padme from his own cot. His expression is unreadable, but he looks far away, until he hears the squeak of Qui-Gon settling on an adjustable work stool.

“Close the curtain,” Obi-Wan says, tone flat, almost a command. 

Qui-Gon raises an eyebrow, at the tone and the request, but Obi-Wan just sighs and leans back on his meager mattress. Qui-Gon stands and yanks at the stubborn curtain, links screeching as he pulls it closed. 

“You should sleep, padawan,” Qui-Gon says softly.

Obi-Wan shakes his head. “Every time I close my eyes…”

Qui-Gon swallows thickly and looks down. He doesn’t need Obi-Wan to finish the sentence. He knows. He sees the dead too. The tally was up to 197 last he heard. He wonders how high the numbers will climb before they reach Coruscant.

“Come here?” Obi-Wan asks.

Qui-Gon settles on the stool once again and rolls closer to Obi-Wan’s head. Obi-Wan reaches out, as if to take Qui-Gon’s hand, then stops and runs his fingers through his hair, or tries to. The battle has left knots and matts of dried blood. 

Obi-Wan grimaces, wipes his hand on his tunic. “I need to talk to him.”

They both know he means Anakin.

Qui-Gon rumbles his assent. “What will you say?” he asks, after a breath.

Obi-Wan smooths the bandages on his left leg, where his leggings have been cut open to allow a bacta patch. He looks down, as if inspecting the wrappings, but Qui-Gon can tell he’s avoiding something. “I don’t know,” he says after several long moments of silence.

Obi-Wan tips his head back, closes his eyes, and scrubs his hands over his face. 

“I am a hypocrite, Qui-Gon,” Obi-Wan says, voice rough. When he finally looks up, Qui-Gon’s breath catches at the heat in Obi-Wan’s eyes. His face burns at the memory. Almost seven years ago now, and not a word of it has passed between them in all that time. 

He has tried to forget, to release his feelings to the Force. He had liked to think he’d been successful. The colours and edges had faded, like a dream. Some days he wondered if he imagined it. Surely he hadn’t…_they_ hadn’t… _collided_ on a distant world in the hazy hours before dawn and woken tangled and sticky and speckled with the glitter from Obi-Wan’s disguise. 

“Maybe you should speak to him?” Obi-Wan continues, voice steadier now. He is offering Qui-Gon an out and asking him a question at the same time, all while maintaining the painful pretense that they are nothing more to each other than master and former apprentice. 

Clever, Qui-Gon thinks, even as his heart sinks in dismay at Obi-Wan’s reluctance to speak plainly.

Will such things matter now, that the Order is cracked and about to embark on a path that Jedi have forsworn for a thousand years?

He will not pretend or hide. Not with Obi-Wan. Not now.

Qui-Gon takes Obi-Wan’s hands in his, smooths the cracks on his knuckles with his thumb. He levels his gaze at Obi-Wan. “I am also a hypocrite,” he answers, letting his own desire shine freely for just a moment.

Obi-Wan laughs. It’s harsh, sardonic, but not devoid of mirth. “What I wouldn't have given to hear you admit that years ago.”

Qui-Gon huffs, and gives Obi-Wan a wistful half-smile. 

And then Obi-Wan’s hand is on his cheek. His heart pounds as Obi-Wan draws him in for a kiss. This time Qui-Gon doesn’t hesitate. He kisses Obi-Wan back fiercely, smothering a groan as their tongues meet. His body, it turns out, has forgotten nothing: lust flashes through him at lightspeed and he is suddenly burning.

Obi-Wan’s lips are cracked and he tastes like blood and earth and longing. 

“Come to me? When we get back to Coruscant?” Obi-Wan breathes against his lips. 

Tears sting Qui-Gon’s eyes as relief threatens to overwhelm him. He cannot speak. He nods and he kisses Obi-Wan more deeply, sliding his hand along his jaw to cup the back of his head and pull him closer.

They cannot risk more than a few moments, not with the grandmaster of the Order only a few feet and a thin curtain away. 

Obi-Wan breaks the kiss first, tapping Qui-Gon’s chest to push him back incrementally.

Obi-Wan’s face is flushed and his blue eyes are glittering. “We should have a few days. Anakin is being sent to escort Padme home.”

Qui-Gon raises his eyebrows. “Is that wise?” 

“Master Yoda suggested it. A last trial, I expect. Before he is knighted.” 

Qui-Gon swallows in alarm. Knighted. Anakin. What kind of example…. He takes a breath. 

They are Jedi. 

“Obi-Wan, I…” he begins, heart sinking into his stomach. 

“Qui-Gon, the galaxy is being torn apart and we don’t know...We don’t…” Obi-Wan’s voice breaks as he touches Qui-Gon’s face. 

Nearly two hundred dead already. How many friends will they bury before this is over?

The life of a Jedi is fraught with danger, but there are also patterns. Sentient beings can be surprisingly predictable in their violence and avarice, and the Force is a powerful ally.  
But he cannot shake the feeling that they are woefully underprepared for Dooku’s unchecked malice, and the scale… Force, the scale of it….

Obi-Wan has already run through these calculations, he realizes as he takes in the shades of foreboding that haunt his former padawan’s features. 

The calluses of Obi-Wan’s saber hand are rough against bare skin of Qui-Gon’s cheek, but his touch is soft, asking and offering without demand. 

Qui-Gon doesn’t understand how he walked away seven years ago, how they smothered and hid and avoided this connection for all that time, because it feels like a living, writhing _thing_ that has a will of its own. Will it lead them astray? Will they be able to fulfil their duties if they allow themselves _more_?

He draws in a long breath and fights for control over his thoughts, his heart, his body. He will not give in to fear. 

“I trust you,” Obi-Wan says. “I trust you to do your duty and never let _this_ compromise your responsibilities. And I promise you the same.”

Qui-Gon swallows, throat tight. He can see the truth in Obi-Wan’s eyes. He does not want to think about the kinds of decisions he may be forced to make in the coming conflict. This will surely be great Trial for all of them: Obi-Wan, Anakin, the Council, the Order, the Republic itself. And the Force shows him nothing but shadows.

Yet he knows he would never dishonour Obi-Wan’s trust, and Obi-Wan would never dishonour his. Two small certainties in a galaxy of chaos. 

He clasps Obi-Wan’s fingers and kisses them as he nods. “On Coruscant, then.”


End file.
